Adventures of a Yaadie in North Carolina

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He Called Me Ma’am

It’s been too long! I’m taking the GRE tomorrow and figured I shouldn’t do anything too work intensive the night before. Heaven knows I’ve missed writing. It’s not as though I didn’t have anything to write about. I just never had the time. I keep trying to tell myself that there are 24 hours in day; no more and no less. So if I want to do something, I’m going to have to fit it in somehow. At any rate that is not what this post is meant to be about….

Today I was walking behind a young man and I may or may not have been checking him out. He was a good distance away from me so he got to the door before I had. He opened it, looked behind him, saw me and held the door. I in turn walked as quickly as my short legs would carry me.

Full House

I finally caught up, smiled brightly and said thanks to which he replied, “You’re welcome ma’am.”

I was nonplussed(GRE word!!!). A bunch of thoughts crossed my mind: Did he call me ma’am? Isn’t that what you call old people? Do I really look that old?

I spent more time than I’d like to admit turning the situation over in my mind. Overthinking has a way of sending us on a tangent; boy did I go on a tangent. Somehow I ended up at: “See, this is why people say chivalry is dead.” Moments before I may or may not have been checking this young man out. He, out of respect, called me ma’am and I spent the next ten minutes deriding (can you tell I’ve been studying?) the poor fellow for calling me an old woman.

It used to be a thing that a man would walk up to a woman he was interested in and be all suave and two years later, they’d be married. Nowadays, men are less willing to approach females because we often find a way to be offended by something that was said with good intent. Please note, I said “men”. I am not trying to make excuses for the little boys who don’t know how to talk to a lady.

This encounter still has me questioning life but the next time someone calls me ma’am, I’ll be prepared!

What d you think? Is Chivalry dead? Or more importantly, did we kill chivalry?

#KultureShocked

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6 thoughts on “He Called Me Ma’am”

I’m from Texas where everyone is referred to as sir or ma’am, so I never take it offensively. Quite the opposite actually! You better open my door for me and call me ma’am… Or we are gonna have some problems lol

A bow in respect for having this mentality
There was this one time, I held the door for a lady and it surprised me how she responded with ” don’t you think I can do that on my own”
I wasn’t expecting a thanks or anything but I surely didn’t expect that